ReadWriteWeb

With large daily newspapers filing for bankruptcy left and right, it is no secret that the journalism industry is going through a severe period of change. Old business models focused on advertising and classifieds have been eroded by more target online ads and by the rise of sites like Craigslist. This era of journalism renaissance has ushered in several non-profit startup news organizations, like ProPublica, an investigative journalism organization, and Spot.us, a site which fosters "community funded reporting".

One site, however, the Center for Independent Media (CIM), a non-profit online journalism network, has taken a different approach to the non-profit journalism model, one which has helped them raise $11.5 million in just four years.

ProPublica is an independent, non-profit newsroom with headquarters in Manhattan. ProPublica's newsroom employs 32 journalists and receives financing from the Sandler Foundation and other contributions. The organization's mission is to continue the tradition of investigative journalism at a time where a lot of newspaper organizations have had to cut back on their newsroom operations. The really interesting thing here, though, is that ProPublica is giving away all of its content to other newspapers and online publishers for free under a non-commercial, no-derivatives Creative Commons license.